CATHY BUCKLE'S LETTTER FROM ZIMBABWE!

VERY VERY !

Dear Family and Friends,

This week has been an exercise in such absurdity that you wonder how anything at all has functioned - and how we have survived it. Monday began with an electricity cut at 7.30 am which lasted for 7 hours. The power came back on but not for long and we ended the day after 11 hours of no power. I met a man on Monday with agonising toothache. He went to have it extracted but the dentist couldn't help - his surgery had neither electricity nor water.

Tuesday we again spent most of the business day in silence, going another 10 hours without electricity, and the water pressure dwindled to a fast drip. There were no street collections of garbage due to no fuel and a friend phoned and said butchers were complaining their meat was smelling and going off in the heat. The story resurfaced about the wrong fertilizer that had been imported bythe government from South Africa. 70 000 tonnes had come in but was found to be too high in some elements and was unsuitable for use on most soils. Apparently high sulphur levels could reduce yields or even destroy crops if used on the wrong soil types. The real bone shaker was yet to come though as the press reported that, oops, the fertilizer had already been delivered to the GMB for giving out to farmers. Double oops, as the GMB said they'd already started distributing it across the country.

Wednesday, could things get worse? Yes. There was no water at all, not even aslow drip but there was electricity so hey, we shouldn't be too capitalistic and ask for both services - even though we pay for them! Thursday the water came back on but now it smells of sewage, is the colour ofurine, has a thick yellow sediment and oily bubbles on top. Headline news was of a lavish ceremony with Mr Mugabe giving out 99 year farm leases to 120 new farmers. Some of the beneficiaries include a high court judge and a chief correspondent on ZBC TV. The caption below the picture on ZBC TV was: "99 year farm leases very constitutional." Then followed an interview with some expert or other who said the 99 year leases were "very very legal." It is not clear if the120 leases were for farms where compensation has been paid to farmers for infrastructure and stolen crops, or to farm workers for loss of livelihood, orto any of the men, women and children who were subjected to all manner of human rights abuses ranging from theft to arson, rape, looting, torture and even murder. It's not funny, very funny or even very very funny, but somehow wec arry on and so we limped into Friday.

Friday word hit my home town that 20 000 new mobile telephone lines were available for sale. No one knew if it was the government owned phone company or the private one doing the selling so there was pandemonium. At the post office there were riot police trying to get people to calm down and get in a queue -and all this for the chance to legally buy a telephone line. How crazy can things get!

It's been a very difficult week for ordinary people in Zimbabwe and it gets harder and harder to hold things together and keep pretending to be normal. I end on a note of hope which I saw at Speech Day at my son's school. Even in such appallingly hard times our schools take such care and pride to turn out fine, well mannered, caring and clever young men and women. All credit to these schools and their dedicated staff who could have fled to easier and greener pastures but haven't because they have hope and vision. Zimbabwe owes them and other professionals a great debt.

Until next time, love cathy.

Copyright cathybuckle 11 November 2006.http:/africantears.netfirms.comMy books "African Tears" and "Beyond Tears" are available from:orders@africabookcentre.com